


Traditions

by RuArcher (Coriesocks)



Series: Shipmas 2018 [3]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Christmas Decorations, Christmas Fluff, Christmas Tree, Established Relationship, M/M, Shipmas 2018, Traditions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-06
Updated: 2018-12-06
Packaged: 2019-09-12 21:53:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16879908
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Coriesocks/pseuds/RuArcher
Summary: Draco isn’t impressed by Harry’s Christmas traditions.





	Traditions

**Author's Note:**

> Shipmas fic no. 3!  
> Prompt: Are you sure this is how the muggles decorate their Christmas trees without magic?  
> Thanks to Soft on the Drarry Discord for the swift beta <3

Draco watched on, bewildered, as Harry dragged the large tree through the door. It was wrapped in white netting to keep the branches from sticking out, but somehow he still managed to get it caught on the door frame, the coat rack, the painting of a nondescript field of sheep that hung in the hall; the trail of pine needles, dirt, and crooked furniture defined a clear path from the front door to the sitting room, where they finally ended up.

“You realise I’m not helping you clean up this mess,” he said as Harry struggled to get the tree upright and wedged into a strange contraption on the floor. 

“You could have helped, you know.”

“And _you_ could have used magic, but no. We have to do as the Muggles do and cart our trees around like Neanderthals. I honestly don’t see why you couldn’t have used magic to at least bring it into the house. I’m going to be picking pine needles out of my socks for weeks!”

Harry straightened, wincing slightly and rubbing his back. He dragged his free hand through his hair, sweeping it off his sweaty forehead. There was dirt smudged across one cheek and Draco was itching to clean it off, but decided in the end that he rather liked the way it made Harry looked rugged and outdoorsy. “I’ve already explained all this to you,” Harry said exasperatedly. “It’s tradition. You can’t just go messing with traditions. First, you have to go to the Christmas tree farm, then pick out the perfect tree, then tie it to the roof of the car, then bring it home—”

Draco pinched the bridge of his nose. “Alright, alright. I don’t need to relive the entire nightmare. Once was more than enough.” He shook his head to clear the image of the damp, crowded, muddy farm they had just returned from. “My shoes are ruined, by the way. Irreparably damaged.”

“I did warn you to wear something appropriate.”

“These shoes are perfectly appropriate for this outfit. How was I to know you’d be dragging me through a muddy, manure-infested field?” 

“Perhaps because I told you? Come on, help me get this thing straight.” He wobbled the tree in its stand and scrutinised it from a few different positions, while Draco stood back and added helpful comments such as ‘left a bit, right a bit, twist it counter-clockwise by forty three degrees’ and so on, much to Harry’s obvious irritation.

When he was satisfied that the tree was completely perpendicular to the floor, he produced a small blade from somewhere about his person, and started cutting away the white netting from the bottom up, the branches spreading out like the petals of a large, green, prickly flower.

“Well,” offered Draco, as they stood side-by-side and looked at the tree, “it’s certainly a statement.”

“Ah, it didn’t look this big in the field.”

“You think?”

Harry spun around to face him. “Why didn’t you say something!” he cried, as if he would have ever listened to Draco in the first place.

“One: When asked my opinion, I clearly remember saying ‘Harry, that tree is far too large. Put it back and choose something sensible,’ and, two: I was cold and wet. I wasn’t about to waste half an hour trying to talk you down from something when you’d clearly already made up your mind. I wanted to go home.”

“It’ll be fine. We’ll just move a few chairs around.”

“Or—and excuse me for being a little avant-garde here—we could always shrink it or lop off a few branches.” He casually pointed his wand at the tree, one eyebrow cocked.

“No! No magic, no tree mutilation. Put it away, Draco,” Harry warned, placing himself between Draco’s wand point and the tree.

“Fine!” he huffed, slipping his wand back into its holster. “You’re no fun.”

“Shut up and help me get the decorations down from the loft, you grumpy old sod,” Harry said as he nudged past Draco, his expression fond. “I want to get this finished before we go to bed tonight.”

Draco sighed, and resigned himself to being Harry’s lackey for the day. At least he’d have a nice view of Harry’s arse going up the ladder.

———

Six boxes. There were _six_ large boxes of Christmas decorations in Harry’s loft, and he’d insisted they carry them all the way down into the sitting room _with no magic_. Apparently this was another part of the tradition, and Merlin forbid they actually try and make things a little easier on themselves. It was as if Harry had forgotten they were both pushing forty and had softened from years of sitting behind a desk.

“Okay,” Harry started, hands on his hips as he surveyed the cluster of boxes. “So, now we go through and sort them out. Good ones go here,” he patted the rug beside him, “toss the bad ones over there, and then stick the maybes on the coffee table. We can do three boxes each so we’ll finish in no time. You take that lot, I’ll do these.” Draco stared, aghast as Harry sat on the floor and dragged the nearest box toward him. “Oh, and anything that looks like it was made by a child gets immediately put into the _good_ pile no matter how crappy it looks.”

“Why didn’t these boxes get sorted _before_ you stuck them in the loft last year?” Draco asked as he tentatively picked through the closest box. “I understand keeping the ornaments made by your offspring, but why on earth do you keep the other ‘bad’ decorations? Why not throw them out?” He flinched as his fingers brushed over something sticky, and hastily withdrew his hand.

Harry shrugged, already elbows deep in his box and covered in glitter and tinsel. “I dunno. I’m guess I’m always in a rush to get everything packed away. And doesn’t everyone have at least one box of broken box of decorations hidden away somewhere?” He pulled out a bauble that was severely lacking in sequins. “That’s one for the ‘maybes’” he muttered.

“I wouldn’t know. I suppose you can at least chuck the bad lot in the bin once you’ve sorted them.”

“What? No! You can’t throw them out!” Harry gasped, staring at Draco as if he had just said he was going to kick a basket of kittens.

“Why on earth not?”

“Because they’re Christmas decorations!”

Draco stared at him in disbelief. “Could I at least _Reparo_ them? See if any are salvageable?”

“No!” Harry cried, horrified. “All the dents and scrapes and missing bits tell a story. See this squirrel in a Santa hat, it’s missing its tail because James and Albus got in a fight over who got to hang it on the tree. And this bauble, with barely any sequins left; Lily decided one year she wanted to bedazzle her bed so started pinching the sequins from all the low hanging decorations. And this straggly string of tinsel is what Albus used to tie James’ legs together after he fell asleep in front of the TV last year. So you see, I can’t throw any of it away.”

Harry spoke so fervently that Draco’s irritation fizzled out. He couldn’t deny Harry had a point—sentimentality had lead to him keeping more than a few toys that Scorpius had long since out-grown—although his lack of organisation, the way he jumbled everything together, was a tad infuriating.

“Might I suggest storing all the broken, vandalised, or generally unusable decorations in a box separate from the other decorations and save yourself the effort of this pre-tree trimming ritual?”

“But I like sorting through the decorations,” Harry whined, looking so much like a chastised puppy, that Draco had no choice but to relent.

“Fine!” he huffed, throwing his hands up. “We’ll do it your way.”

They spent over an hour sorting through all the boxes. It didn’t help that Harry disagreed with Draco’s opinion on what constituted a ‘bad’ decoration, but then Draco could have made things go more smoothly by not emptying the entire contents of his final box onto the ‘bad’ pile in a fit of pique. Harry had then insisted upon thoroughly rechecking both the ‘bad’ and ‘okay’ piles once he was done with his own boxes. Draco was about ready to smack his head against the wall by the time Harry finally finished. 

“Right, now we just need to untangle the lights, then we can decorate!” Harry declared happily.

“Untangle the lights? Why the fuck didn’t you stow them neatly in the first place? What’s wrong with you? Do you just upend the tree, shake until all the decorations fall off, then seal the boxes and hope for the best?”

“Oh come off it, everyone knows there is no way store Christmas lights without them tying themselves in knots. It’s science.” 

“Salazar give me strength,” Draco muttered as Harry handed him a tangled ball of electrical wires. “I’m assuming this is another one of those no-magic tasks?”

“Glad to see you’re finally catching on.” Harry grinned, looking intolerably pleased with himself. Merlin, but the man looked ridiculous, surrounded by baubles and shiny things, glitter caught in his hair, a lap full of Christmas lights. Draco heaved another put-upon sigh and started trying to undo his own knot of lights. The things he did for this man.

———

“You’re absolutely certain this is how Muggles decorate their trees?” Draco asked. He was perched half way up a rickety old step-ladder and leaning across the Christmas tree to try and hang a bauble on a branch that, according to Harry, looked a little bare. How he could tell that from the floor, Draco didn’t know. There was hardly and inch of tree still visible! The whole thing was a riot of tinsel and lights and garish ornaments, none of it matching, and half of it missing pieces. It looked like it’d been attacked by a swarm of glitter wielding toddlers.

“Yeah! Isn’t it fantastic? Just the star left now. Here.” He reached up and passed Draco a ratty looking plastic star with half the gold scratched off.

“And you want this on the top?” 

“Obviously! You _have_ seen a Christmas tree before, right?” 

“Not like this I haven’t,” he muttered. “Hold on.” He eyed the top of the tree nervously, then climbed up the next few rungs of the ladder. It wobbled perilously and he said a silent prayer that this wouldn’t be how his life ended. What an utterly mortifying end that would be. “Why am I the one that has to do this?” he asked as he stretched out an arm to test if he could reach the top yet.

“Because you’re taller?”

“Only because I’m up a bloody ladder! You’re the Gryffindor—climbing up wooden ladders held together by spit and varnish should be right up your alley.”

“Okay, fine. It’s…it’s a tradition. The oldest always has to put the star on top, and now that’s you.”

Draco risked a look over his shoulder to where Harry was standing at the base of the tree. He wasn’t looking at Draco though, he was staring at that ridiculous tailless squirrel in a Santa hat, which he had retrieved from the ‘bad’ pile at some point. His thumb smoothed absently across the comical green jumper it was wearing, and he appeared to be lost to his thoughts. It suddenly struck Draco that perhaps Harry was clinging to these traditions because he was lonely—it was his first Christmas without his children, and even though he’d be seeing them at the Burrow, it wasn’t quite the same as having a houseful for the entire holidays.

Rather than complain any further about his task, Draco focused on getting the hideous star positioned exactly to Harry’s specifications, definitely not shrieking when the ladder almost tipped him into the tree. He knew he couldn’t make up for the fact that Ginny had the children this year, but he vowed to do what he could to try and take Harry’s mind off his loneliness. 

———

With the star in position, the lights turned on, and unused decorations shunted to one side for the time being, Draco flopped onto the sofa and gratefully accepted the proffered glass of Firewhisky from Harry. 

“Are we finally done?” Draco asked, taking a sip of the deep brown liquid and closing his eyes as he savoured the burn. He definitely felt like he’d earned a drink today.

“Yeah, it’s perfect.”

Draco scrutinised their work. He had to admit, it didn’t look too awful now it was dark outside and the multicoloured lights were twinkling in the branches, casting colourful reflections over the room. He glanced over at Harry and found his eyes already on him, smiling softly. The crinkles around his eyes, the faint furrows on his forehead, the laughter lines around his mouth, were smoothed flat by the soft, warm light from the fire, stripping the years from him. Merlin, but when had they gotten so old?

“Thanks, Draco.”

“What for?”

“For indulging me. For going along with all the little Christmas traditions. I know you hated it, but you coped…well, not admirably, but you coped.”

“You definitely made things a lot harder than they needed to be, but I didn’t _hate_ it.” He smiled and raised an arm. Harry eagerly took the invitation, shuffling closer and resting his head on Draco’s shoulder. A comfortable silence fell between them, the only sounds coming from the crackling fire and the ticking of the Grandfather clock in the hall. It was so peaceful, Draco thought he might drop off. 

After a short while, during which Draco’s eyes did _not_ drift closed, not even for a second, Harry sighed. Draco looked down, but Harry was staring at the glass of Firewhisky in his hand, tilting it from side to side so it seemed to glow as it caught the firelight. Draco was alarmed to see his eyes shimmering. Before he could ask what was wrong, though, Harry spoke. “Did you know, this is going to be the first Christmas since the kids were born that they’re not all going to be at Grimmauld. James is off doing his own thing, Albus would rather be seen dead than go to a Christmas tree farm or hang out with his dad, and Lily is spending the holidays with Gin.” He sighed deeply again, rubbing a hand across his mouth. “I guess…I guess I thought that by keeping up all the traditions we’d created as a family over the years, the place would feel less empty, less soulless.”

Draco squeezed Harry’s shoulder, a silent display of support. “Did it work?” 

“Not really.”

“Well, it was a valiant attempt. And we’ll see everyone at the Burrow for Christmas day, so there’s that to look forward to.”

“Yeah.” He smiled then, a genuine smile, no doubt imagining the chaotic jumble of his family. “So, did Scorpius say anything after you wrote to him? Does he suspect anything?”

“He was confused, but excited, and I’m sure he would have indicated if he had any idea of our news, so don’t worry.”

“I’m not worried! Nervous, yes, but not worried. I really hope we don’t ruin Christmas for them…”

“It’ll be okay, Harry. Children are very resilient, especially ours.”

Harry snorted. “Yeah, I suppose you’re right.” Draco watched the smile drop from his face as he became wistful again, so he hugged him closer. 

“Don’t worry. We can make our own traditions, together.”

“That might be the most romantic thing you’ve ever said to me,” Harry said looking up into his eyes and grinning.

“Well don’t get used to it. Come on. Up. We’re getting this room tidied, and if you tell me I can’t use my wand, our first Christmas tradition is going to be a break-up.”

“I love you too, Draco.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Find me on tumblr @ [coriesocks](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/coriesocks)


End file.
